


Tesco's Finest

by oddishly



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-12
Updated: 2019-01-12
Packaged: 2019-10-08 01:21:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17376845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oddishly/pseuds/oddishly
Summary: It's what should be a textbook sexual identity crisis.





	Tesco's Finest

**Author's Note:**

  * For [obeytherandomness](https://archiveofourown.org/users/obeytherandomness/gifts).



> Happy holidays and happy new year, obeytherandomness! I had so much fun writing this for you--I hope you enjoy it too.
> 
> Thank you so much to glovered, who read every word of this 17 times and then some. You rock.

Merlin enters his fifth month of flat-sitting in the last week of November.

“Met this _fit_ girl,” Gwaine shouts down the phone from what Merlin can only assume is the deck of a cargo ship in a storm. “From Manchester. Her dad’s—" the line crackles into a rush of static and Merlin pulls the phone away from his ear “—Belize, couldn’t believe it—”

Merlin pulls the phone away again.

“—fireman, or something, so I told her—”

“So another few weeks?” says Merlin when the signal comes back.

“Yeah mate, that’d be great, actually better make it—”

Merlin looks from the phone, which is now loudly announcing the end of the call, and over his shoulder to Arthur-from-the-second-floor standing out in the hallway holding the top end of Merlin’s Christmas tree. “That was my landlord. Er, my friend. He’s off travelling. Sounds like he’s getting some nice weather.”

“Right,” says Arthur. “Well, as long as someone’s enjoying himself. You ready to …?” He gives his end of the tree a heft. “It’s not getting any lighter.”

Merlin hadn’t really expected anyone else to be this involved with his Christmas tree installation. He hadn’t really planned on buying one at all, although _buying_ was also not the right word so much as _pulled out of a skip on a whim_. As such, he has no tree-sized space cleared in his flat, nor a stand to put it in, so they just lean it up against the dishwasher for now.

“I know we literally only just met—” Merlin starts.

“Sorry,” he finds himself repeating ten minutes later, heaving the sofa away from the wall at one end while Arthur strains from the other. “Not actually mine—turns out Gwaine—my friend—’s got a freakish thing for heavy furniture, it’s a problem—”

“It’s fine,” says Arthur. “Let’s just—”

“Oops—”

“Shit—”

“This’ll do!” says Merlin, and they drop the sofa with a thud of iron feet on the floor.

Arthur looks from the sofa’s new position in the middle of the room to the empty triangle of space now behind it. Merlin peers over the back too.

“Seems too much to ask if you have a hoover,” Arthur murmurs, which astute as it is, is awfully rude coming from some posh git who only met Merlin ten minutes ago.

“Would you know how to use it if I did?” retorts Merlin. He looks up, and with a sinking heart, realises their catastrophic error. “God, sorry, watch out—!” he says, shoving Arthur sideways as the salvaged tree snaps clean down the line of an aborted axing and timbers tragically to the ground between them.

 

 

Arthur works at Tesco. Merlin learns this the next day, after taking himself on a walk to the Tesco café at lunch and asking for, “An egg salad sandwich, please. And a cup of tea,” once he gets up to the till.

“Would you like a stupidly early mince pie with that?” comes a posh git voice from over his shoulder. “Or another tree to finish me off with?”

Merlin turns to find Arthur (from the second floor) (Merlin had honestly expected never to see him again) standing behind him with a clipboard and a blank expression, wearing a blue uniform shirt with a badge that says “Arthur Pendragon – Assistant Manager”.

“Are you always such a drama queen?” says Merlin, turning back to accept his sandwich from the cashier. Seriously. Never thought he’d see Arthur again. Definitely not in Tesco. “I don’t know what all this fuss is about, it barely scratched you.”

“Almost killed me,” corrects Arthur. “If I hadn’t jumped clear—”

“If I hadn’t _saved_ you—"

“Probably would’ve snapped my neck.”

“—might’ve got a few pine needles in your hair,” says Merlin loudly over him, “but since you insisted on helping me carry it up the stairs—”

“Uselessly, as it turned out.”

“—seemed impolite not to push you out of the way.”

"Thank you, Merlin.”

Merlin smiles. “You’re welcome. Don’t you have any work to do?” Because clearly he doesn’t, and Merlin’s favourite table by the window is a little separate from the rest so it’s nice to have a conversation over. But when he looks around he scowls at finding his table has been taken over by a teetering pile of library books and a student on her phone. Typical.

Resigning himself to a thoroughly sub-par lunch experience, he looks back at Arthur who is now helping a mum affix a baby-carrier securely inside her trolley.

The mum walks away with a thank you and Arthur catches Merlin’s eye and smirks as a safe-for-work middle finger before walking backwards in the opposite direction towards a lost-looking pair of foreign tourists, or perhaps towards a grandmother, or someone else in need of rescue. “Oh and Merlin? Don’t forget your tea.”

“Right,” says Merlin, surprised, because he totally had.

 

 

Merlin is an admin at a vocational college five minutes away from Arthur’s Tesco, and spends most of his lunch breaks fighting students for the good table. Even so, it’s a couple of nights later in the Apple and Parrot, one big car park and two Indian restaurants away from his flat, when Merlin sees Arthur next. He’s sitting at the bar with a paperback book and a pint, heavy black coat hanging over the bar stool beside him even though it’s still in double figures at 9 o’clock at night and only gently raining, and he technically lives closer to the pub than Merlin does.

Percival is late to meet Merlin as usual. It’s only polite to walk up to Arthur and say, “Mind if I …?” while gesturing at the stool beside him. “If I promise not to try to kill you?”

“Oh, hello,” says Arthur, putting his book down with the relief of one previously reading a book alone at the bar. He picks up his coat and drapes it awkwardly over his knees. “Fancy seeing you here.”

Merlin searches for something to say. “What were you reading?”

“Oh, it’s—” Arthur picks up the book and shows the subdued-looking cover to Merlin. “My sister recommended it. Actually, she recommended it then gave it to me for my birthday.”

“That was nice of her.” Merlin hangs his raincoat on the next chair over and sits. “Think I saw that on a list of books to read.” Well, he might have. In theory. Merlin’s just trying to have a conversation, here. “Though maybe it was on a list of what not to read. Is it good?”

“Interesting writing style. Took me a while to get around to reading it though, and unfortunately my sister is one of those people who actually reads the things you recommend, then returns the book and talks about it with you, so I’ve been feeling guilty.”

“I don’t believe you,” says Merlin. “Those people don’t exist.”

“Trust me, if she was anyone else, I wouldn’t believe it myself,” says Arthur, catching the bartender’s eye and gestures for Merlin to order. “This cider’s good.”

An hour later, still no Percival, but they’re several pints down and Merlin hasn’t attempted to kill Arthur yet for responding to the question of who Gwaine is and why he’s not paying his own goddamn rent with a smirk and an, “Oh. You mean he’s on his _gap_ yah.”

“He is not,” says Merlin, plonking his own glass down on the bar, sloshing cider. “He’s worked since he was 14, never went to college or university, and started his own business two years ago and employs like …” Merlin waves his hand vaguely. “A lot of people.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. _Oh_.”

They look at each other while the sounds of the rest of the pub mull around them, fairy lights twinkling merrily along the windowsills and around the picture frames, and the rain attempts to peter out against the window before returning with a vengeance. Then Arthur leans back against the stool and smiles a bit and says, “If I was making up a story about how very not wealthy my friend-slash-landlord was, I’d have started him out at 12.”

Merlin narrows his eyes. “Meaning?”

“No new business owner leaves the country for that long. Or at all. He’s a trust fund kid, isn’t he.”

“I should let him catch you saying that. But I won’t.”

“Because you don’t know when he’s going to be back from his cargo ship adventures.”

“Well. Yes. But he doesn’t have a trust fund.” Merlin thinks. This might be a difficult story to maintain. “Or a business. If you ever meet him, don’t tell him I, er, suggested he was someone’s boss, or my landlord, or I’ll never hear the end of it. He’s a hairdresser.”

“Really?”

“Really,” says Merlin. “He packed his scissors on a bit of a whim and last I heard had more money than he left the country with.”

“Good for him,” says Arthur after a moment. “Another drink?”

 

 

In the morning, Merlin gives himself a toaster’s worth of time to think about Arthur. By this he means getting out his phone and peering at the text message Arthur had sent him from the pub.

_this is arthur pendragon_

Merlin shakes his head.

_How many Arthurs do you think I know?_

_there were four arthurs in my form alone_ comes the immediate response. Merlin wonders if Arthur is also standing in front of his toaster with a cup of tea and wearing his dressing gown.

_That’s the rule at private schools, isn’t it?_

_there were a few merlins, too, actually_

Merlin frowns at his phone. He’s never met or heard of another Merlin in his life.

 _lol_ says Arthur before Merlin can reply, then a laughing emoji. It seems so wildly out of character that Merlin laughs. Then the toast pops up and he jumps.

 _Liar!_ he sends back, and decides to put Arthur out of his mind.

 

 

Arthur buys his own Christmas tree on December 1st, which to Merlin’s mind is unforgivably late, but there’s no accounting for taste. Arthur lives on the second floor, not the fifth, and the lift is working, and he’s already prepared a space for the tree to sit, all of which means—Merlin has been repeatedly assured—it’s going to be a notably easier endeavour to get it situated than when Merlin took early initiative with his own tree. It’s cold outside, though, an infrequent but chilly wind curling underneath Merlin’s coat. Their building is still a long way away, and Arthur, who appears to be one of those athletic types, is setting what any reasonable person would call a thoroughly _un_ reasonable pace through Christmas shoppers with the tree hefted up on his shoulder.

“’Took the initiative.’” Arthur heaves the trunk up higher on his shoulder to better condescend at Merlin over it. “That’s what we’re calling it?”

“Yes,” Merlin says, “and you’ll remember that _my_ tree didn’t require half of the town’s high street Christmas shoppers having to duck and limbo to get to the next shop, did you _have_ to get the biggest one?”

On cue, a pair of teenage girls in bottle-green blazers and striped ties, tinsel wrapped around their ponytails, stop short in front of them to avoid getting knocked into the road by the tree. They give Merlin joint filthy scowls then catch sight of Arthur, who ignores their giggles and says, “It’s not my fault people don’t know how to shop effectively.”

“Effectively,” Merlin scoffs, hoisting the tree over his head and onto his other shoulder as they pass under the town sign flashing SEASON’S GREETINGS. “Gift certificates all round, is it?”

“Debenhams,” Arthur points to the left, then swivels his arm to the other side of the road, “M&S,” then jabs his thumb over his shoulder. “Argos, and that quirky little jewellery shop. Silver something. Write a list beforehand and you’re done in an afternoon.”

“Christmas must be thrilling at your house.”

They turn into the dank little alley leading up to their block of flats and Merlin says, “Hold on a sec.” He lets the tree roll down his arm and leans it up against the wall, and puts his hands on his hips and leans until his back cracks. “My car—”

“We’ve walked a quarter of a mile,” says Arthur firmly. “At most. I refuse to drive the next quarter of a mile just to avoid carrying one slightly above average-size Christmas tree—look, Merlin, it’s just the car park left.”

“That is a very disingenuous remark,” Merlin tells him. “It’s a very big car park.”

“Should’ve thought about that when you made me carry your defective tree up five flights of stairs two minutes after meeting me, shouldn’t you?” says Arthur. “Just a couple of hundred metres to go, come on. You owe me.”

“It’s not defective,” Merlin mumbles. “It’s tailored to the space available.”

Arthur tilts his head. His teeth flash in the light of the streetlamp above. “Tell me it’s not still there in your flat.”

“Okay,” says Merlin agreeably, bending to pick up the base of the tree again. If he squints up, he can see the string of fairy lights straining to hold the tree up against his window. “‘It’s not still—’”

 

 

Arthur’s flat is on the same side of the same building to Merlin’s so of course it is identical to Merlin’s. Ostensibly. However unlike in Merlin’s flat, there’s a squishy sort of sofa on one side by the window and something that can’t decide if it’s a coffee table or a dining room table extending out beside it, a TV and fancy speaker system beside the bedroom door, a clothes horse laden down with polo shirts by the other window, and then a neat row of what on closer look turns out to be poetry books lining the bookshelves.

“You really do contain multitudes,” says Merlin, pulling out a Sylvia Plath collection and waving it at Arthur.

“You’ve met me three times,” says Arthur, which is a very poor argument, because so far, on this their now fourth meeting, Arthur is shaping into precisely the person Merlin had already deciphered him into. “How do you know poetry isn’t central to my personality?”

“I’m a very good judge of character,” says Merlin. “And even if I wasn’t, why do you think I’m looking around?” He continues nosing. The kitchen is well-stocked, there’s a pile of elderly-looking board games in a corner that includes three variations on Monopoly and a bag of colourful dice, and a picture of Arthur with his arm wrapped around a dark-haired girl that Merlin wants to describe as _striking_ or _beautiful_ or something equally embarrassing hangs on the wall. “Girlfriend?”

Arthur peers over. “Nope.”

Merlin thinks quickly. “Sister,” he corrects. “Er. I wasn’t thinking about how hot she is, she’s—”

“Very hot,” says Arthur. “Making lots of money from it, too.”

A picture pushed to the back of the counter shows a slightly younger Arthur standing with a stern man beside a sports car.

Merlin had decided very soon after meeting Arthur that regardless of where he was now, titchy flat and all, Arthur was someone who “came from money” and was working in a supermarket “for the experience”—it needed to be thought in speech marks—and “appreciating what money means to other people” before settling down in whatever job his parents had lined up for him. “Oh yeah?”

“She’s a model,” says Arthur. “Lots of people in New York would recognise her, apparently. And Dallas, Chicago, New Orleans, and Los Angeles.”

“I, meanwhile, have worked with people for years who introduce themselves at every Christmas party,” Merlin replies, though it seems unfair to hold that against someone with so unfortunate a life as John from Marketing. “What’s her name?”

“Morgana,” says Arthur. He pauses. “And this is our father.”

Merlin looks again at the proffered picture, the one with Arthur and the man beside a sports car. The man—Arthur’s dad—is wearing what in Merlin’s extremely uneducated eye is a very fancy suit. So is Arthur. They’re standing on one of those long gravel drives and Merlin has the feeling that just beyond the edge of the shot is a mansion, or a fountain set amidst a beautiful rose garden, or something else that assistant managers at supermarkets don’t usually spend a lot of time around.

He searches for something to say. “Does your dad, um. Own a lot of supermarkets?”

“My dad is a very successful lawyer.” After another moment’s hesitation (Merlin’s really tapping into Arthur’s reticent side here) Arthur continues with, “And he didn’t like it very much when I told him I might be gay.”

Merlin tries not to say anything foolish like _holy smokes!_ or inappropriate like _might be?_ or _didn’t see that one coming_ or _tell me more_ , and finds himself instead making an inexplicable tutting noise.

“Pardon?” says Arthur.

“Nothing.” Merlin gives himself a mental shake and swallows all his questions, then puts the photo down and turns. “I'm sorry. That’s terrible.”

Arthur nods. Another long moment later, he says, “You have to help me find Christmas tree decorations.” He doesn’t sound very enthusiastic about it. “I have no idea where Morgana put them. That girl’s a nuisance.”

“I have a better idea,” says Merlin. “I beat you at Monopoly”—Arthur makes a similar tutting noise to what Merlin just did, how funny—"then you buy me my victory pint.”

“You can try,” says Arthur, which Merlin takes to mean he thinks he’s going to win or something, which is hilarious because while Merlin isn’t especially good at Monopoly, he has absolutely no problem cheating.

 

 

 _lord of the rings on bbc4 in ten minutes_ comes late on Saturday afternoon. It’s followed by a second text moments later. _the extended version tho_. Then, _unfortunately_.

_How very dare they._

_if u can’t transform a third of a classic novel into a film under 3 hours long, it shouldn’t be done_

_I fell asleep in the theatre twice at the end of Return of the King_ Merlin texts back. He didn’t, but he suspects Arthur’s reaction will be entertaining enough to make it worth the lie. _I agree._

_merlin i cannot believe i let you into my home_

Merlin, already on the sofa watching cooking videos on YouTube after a long hard day of thinking about buying Christmas presents, including a watch for Percival and a lamp for Gwaine to replace the one Merlin had broken, although technically—anyway, Merlin finds the channel and watches for an hour before his phone rings. It’s Arthur.

“I took all the garlic breads going out today, I have like, twelve,” Merlin hears over the swooping tones of the film in the background. “Want to help me eat them?”

“Okay,” Merlin says, just as Legolas offers his bow to the Council of Elrond.

“And my axe,” he and Arthur declare together, and Merlin goes to put on some trousers.

 

 

Not that Merlin has a hankering for going flying on the ice or skidding through snow and slurry every morning and afternoon, but he wouldn’t mind if it got five degrees colder and stopped raining every once in a while. On the last day of work, he skips the enormous Christmas buffet, locates his waterproofs, and nips off down to Tesco.

With his back to the window in case he’s caught, Merlin takes a bite of his egg salad sandwich. Then wrinkles his nose. “The bread’s stale,” he notes out loud.

“Is not.”

“It is,” Merlin insists, turning to look at Arthur. He takes another small bite and makes another face to prove it. “I've been looking forward to this sandwich all morning. Now I’m going to have to—”

“Buy another one?” says Arthur dryly, and to Merlin’s surprise, reaches over his shoulder to pluck the sandwich right out of his hands to take a bite of his own.

“Well I’ll have to now!”

Arthur ignores him, chomping his way through the sandwich and licking salad cream off his fingers as he goes. Merlin has time to wonder how one day you can be just minding your business doing your shopping at the local Tesco and only a few weeks later you’re having your shopping eaten right in front of you by an errant employee.

“The ploughman’s my favourite,” Arthur says after he’s finished. “But this isn’t bad, either.”

Merlin has a sudden, brilliant idea. “Can you get me my lunch for free?”

“Why would I do that?” asks Arthur, eyebrows raised.

“Well, firstly, because you just ate mine,” Merlin says, and gives Arthur a severe look. “And secondly, because I have been very useful to you, assisting with manual labour and neighbourly pursuits and whatnot. And thirdly, because you work here.”

“I do?” Arthur looks down at his uniform, then back up at Merlin. “Oh, this. I just find polo shirts comfortable. They’re very flattering, actually. In the right light. Usually when there’s not much of it.”

Arthur’s not so bad, once you get to know him. Of course, that doesn’t make up for the whole errant employee thing. Merlin does actually need to have lunch. He narrows his eyes at Arthur, considering, and makes the benevolent decision to let him off the hook. He opens his mouth to say so.

“I’ll get you a pasty,” says Arthur before he can get a word out. “Have you got time for me to heat it up for you?”

“That’s nice of you,” Merlin says.

“Yes—well. Do you have time?”

“And horrible at accepting a—that wasn’t even a compliment,” says Merlin, who—looking out at the teeming rain—does in fact have time. He leans back to get a ketchup sachet from the counter and thwaps it between his fingers. “Cheese and onion, please.”

 

 

Merlin’s mother calls on Christmas Eve to wish him a merry Christmas, which it already is, just, in New Zealand.

“Going down the pub with some people,” Merlin says vaguely, in answer to her question. He twirls the string of his hoodie around his finger, idly pretending it’s a phone cord instead. “Booked this fancy lunch way back in October and completely forgot about it, I was ready to just bring the whole contents of the pub to my flat until Perce called me up yesterday to remind me.”

“That was lucky,” says Hunith. She sounds like she’s just down the road still and not eleven thousand miles away about to eat a Christmas picnic on a beach nearby. It’s not that Merlin doesn’t miss her, of course he does, but sometimes he wonders whether it should have been him to go off adventuring. Then he rolls his eyes at himself. _Adventuring._

He listens to her talking about her new boyfriend, then about German tourists, then Taika Waititi. Then he catches himself wondering what Arthur is doing and if he’s still at work and realises he has to go if he’s going to make good on his more concrete plans for tomorrow. “Is it even morning there yet?” he asks, knowing perfectly well, as the sun sinks below his window frame, that it’s not even close to dawn yet in Auckland and feeling a surge of fondness for his lovely, ridiculous mum. “Aren’t you waking everyone up?”

“No, no. Anyway, it’s conditioned into me,” says Hunith. “Waking up this early on Christmas morning. My four year old saw to that, blame him.”

“Your four year old is planning to get drunk very soon,” Merlin tells her. “Bye, mum.”

Ten minutes later, he’s heaving a basket around the supermarket and up to the till.

“Evening,” says Arthur.

“Evening,” says Merlin.

They look between them at the shelf of liquor that’s been relocated into Merlin’s basket. Arthur reaches in and starts scanning. “Big plans for tomorrow?”

“Oh, huge. Massive party with loads of food,” Merlin says. “Then drinking myself into oblivion, the usual. Everything you’d expect.”

“Naturally,” says Arthur, looking at all the bottles again.

 

 

Merlin’s doorbell rings at an extremely unsociable hour for Christmas Day. Fortunately, Merlin is already up and in a generous mood. He’s just got started on his second margarita and his second box of mince pies and in a minute he’s going to put the oven on for his turkey.

“Assistant Manager Arthur!” he cries when he opens the door. “My favourite Assistant Manager. The best one. Right on time, come in.”

Assistant Manager Arthur, who isn’t wearing a Christmas jumper or even anything that looks like one, looks surprised. “That’s lucky,” he says. “I didn’t know I was expected. Or invited. Actually I was just going to head back down—”

“Don’t be a sillybilly,” interrupts Merlin, because sometimes you say things that you can never take back. He takes a step into the hallway—Arthur steps back—and gestures inside with both hands. “In,” Merlin says with an inviting look, then points at the hallway again, “or out, which is it?”

With the same, slow inevitability of the falling Christmas tree, the door clicks gently to a close. Assistant Manager Arthur looks at it and Merlin looks at him. Then he looks at the door and says, “Hmm. That wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“No,” says Arthur, or maybe it’s more of a, “No?”

“Definitely don’t have my keys.”

“Ah.”

“Assistant Manager—"

“You can just call me Arthur. Everyone else does. It’s worked well for you before now, too, actually.”

Merlin can take a hint. “Okay, _Arthur_.” Then he stops and scratches his eyebrow. “Yeah, this was not part of my Christmas plans.”

“No,” agrees Arthur.

They stand in silence for a moment. Merlin’s never really paid much attention to the hallway before.

“Well the second Lord of the Rings is about to start,” says Arthur. “And I was just bringing you that one leftover bottle of vodka that didn’t fit into your basket yesterday. You can tell whoever was coming over to come to mine instead, if you want.”

“No one’s coming over,” says Merlin. Then he remembers that according to Arthur, people are definitely on their way over. “Because they all cancelled last minute. Food poisoning. Really unlucky, actually.”

Arthur stares at him. “They all got food poisoning at once? How many people are you talking about, here?”

“Oh, um, five,” says Merlin. “They must’ve gone out to eat at the same place last night without telling me. Bastards,” he ends with fervour, then, “they deserve it”—feeling it adds a certain something.

“Right,” says Arthur. He eyes Merlin, who is only wearing socks and PJs and, of course, a Primark reindeer jumper. It's maroon. “You coming, then?”

 

 

It’s very sad that Arthur doesn’t get to spend Christmas with his family, of course, and it’s unfortunate that Merlin’s turkey is slowly defrosting on the countertop without any chance of being cooked, but Merlin is having a _great_ Christmas.

Arthur, it turns out, is a “bit of a whiz in the kitchen”—that’s the vodka talking, it’s a good thing Arthur came to rescue him from the rest of his purchases, Merlin really can’t handle his alcohol —“I can so,” says Merlin indignantly. “And you didn’t ‘rescue’ me from anything. If anything you’re the reason I needed rescuing.”

“Can’t,” says Arthur, hardly sparing Merlin a glance. “And I am not.”

Merlin begs to differ. Anyway. Moving on. “Nice apron.” He leans on the counter and looks Arthur up and down.

“Thank you.” Arthur continues whisking sauce for the pasta he had promised would be delicious with the lamb. Merlin’s never had pasta with Christmas dinner before, or lamb, for that matter, but he’s willing to believe it will be good based on what he can smell right now.

“Did you get the slippers to match?”

Arthur looks and frowns. “They don’t match.”

“They do.” Merlin points to the apron, then the slippers. “Kiss the cook apron. Matching fussy red slippers.”

“They’re not _fussy_ , Merlin, they’re clean. Sorry you can’t tell the difference.” He goes back to the sauce. “Hand over the vodka.”

Merlin unscrews the lid on the bottle and passes it across the counter for Arthur to upend into the saucepan. Everything smells amazing, and now there’s vodka in the pasta sauce too. And in Merlin’s glass of cranberry juice. And Arthur’s.

He looks up to catch Arthur hiding a smile in the saucepan—Merlin feels a bright, warm feeling curl through his chest at the sight, that’s interesting—so he takes the opportunity to steal a forkful of creamy, cheesy, buttery mashed potato out from under his nose. Yum.

 

 

Two days after his hangover, Merlin goes to bother Arthur at work, and eventually finds him in the confectionery aisle pointing a laser thingy at the Wotsits and sneaking occasional looks at his phone when customers aren’t walking by. He jumps when Merlin says, “Oh, hello.”

“Merlin,” Arthur says in a tone Merlin interprets as relief, then goes off on one about the football as if picking up a conversation they’ve been having with great enthusiasm.

The thing is, Merlin might be gay, too. He’s like, 95% certain, in that way where—actually this seems like something he might want to be saying out loud.

“Look, Arthur, when you said _might be_ ,” he says, interrupting Arthur’s earnest and completely wrong interpretation of the Bristol Rovers’ new match strategy, which is a subject Merlin will be returning to to correct him on later—“was that like: and then you decided you’re not, or then you decided that you are.”

“Um—”

“Gay,” Merlin clarifies.

“The second,” says Arthur eventually.

“Right,” says Merlin. “Because the thing is that I might be gay, too. I mean, I don’t know. This is literally the first time I’ve ever considered it. But I’ve spent the last five weeks completely preoccupied with you and I, er. Well. I missed you today.”

Arthur is starting to look very strained. Merlin has a pretty good feeling he isn’t given to talking about his feelings, or anyone else’s. Not in a bad way. Just in an Arthur way.

“I think,” says Arthur, “that that doesn’t mean you’re gay.”

“Right,” says Merlin again. “But it might.”

“I think new friendships can be a lot, so—Merlin, you must have someone else you can talk about this with. And this isn’t really the place?”

Merlin fixes him with a look, somewhat scandalized. “You want me to tell someone else I’ve fantasized about you?”

Arthur turns very quickly red. “You have?”

“Yeah,” says Merlin. This is turning into the sort of horrible conversation he’d rather not be having at all, to be honest, but the more he thinks about it the more he just, “I dunno. You’re telling me stupid football opinions and I really just want to—to—”

Arthur screws up his face even more. Then he shrugs and puts his laser gun on the shelf, and leans forward and kisses Merlin. It’s soft and awkward, the bag of Quavers or whatever that Arthur is holding in his other hand crunches between them, and it only ends when a little old lady interrupts to ask where to find the loo roll.

Arthur beckons for Merlin to follow as he leads the way to aisle five, home products, and they’re silent waiting for the woman to finish picking out her preferred brand.

“Right,” says Merlin, yet again, as she leaves. He’s feeling a bit thrown. “That wasn’t too horrible.”

Arthur laughs. Laughs! “See you later, Merlin.” And he gives Merlin a gentle push towards the door.

 

 

Merlin spends the rest of that day and the next trying and failing to put his entire life under the microscope. Not that this has to change his entire life or anything. Merlin likes Arthur a lot and anyway, a kiss doesn’t have to be more than a kiss unless you want it to be. Honest.

It’s not exactly profound but on Friday night, absent any other revelations, Merlin decides to take the opportunity to guilt someone into getting a drink with him at a little pub a short way down the road. It’s Christmas, after all, and he doesn’t have to be back at work for another two days.

Percival texts an immediate ‘yes’, uncharacteristically prompt for one who is usually either at the gym or down the pub already.

Merlin arrives first, realises he’s got at least a twenty-minute wait for Percival, spends a second wondering if he could carry off the whole reading a book at the bar while he waits thing that Arthur—whoops, let’s not open that can of worms—wait, is that: “Arthur?”

One Arthur Pendragon turns in his seat at the bar. “Merlin?”

“Merlin?” comes another voice from behind them.

Merlin spins, stomach still turning over. “Percival!” Early, somehow. “Happy Christmas! Here’s your present!”

Percival looks bemused at the mess of sellotape and wrapping paper that Merlin thrusts into his hands. “Oh. Didn’t know we were doing presents,” he says. “I’ll get your drinks. Pint?”

“Thanks!” says Merlin brightly as Percival about-turns towards an empty spot at the other end of the bar, and turns to look at Arthur again. “Hey.”

“Hey,” says Arthur. No book this time, Merlin notes. Maybe this isn’t the right kind of place. Also, no drink yet.

He does an awkward slide onto the stool next to Arthur and gestures at the space on the bar in front of him. “Did you just get here?”

“Yep,” says Arthur. “I was waiting for someone to arrive.”

“Oh.” Merlin does the same awkward slide back off. “Sorry, didn’t mean to—”

“It’s okay. He only just got here.”

Merlin looks at the door, where no one new is standing, to the bar, where Percival has inexplicably started doing shots with a group of strangers—actually with a hen party, never mind—and no one looks like they’re looking for Arthur. He looks back to Arthur again, where still no one is trying to shuffle Merlin out of the way—wait. “Ohhhhhh. Oh, okay. You’re meeting—sorry! I’ll leave you to it.”

Arthur rolls his eyes and picks up his phone to send a text. Five seconds later, Merlin’s bag starts vibrating, and Merlin dives inside for his phone and finds two messages from Arthur.

_drink?_

_never mind_

Merlin slides back onto the stool, cool as a cucumber.

“But I don’t want to intrude,” Arthur begins, and goes to stand, because he really is someone who says things like that. Merlin pulls him back down.

“You invited me to get a drink,” he says firmly. “Now I’m inviting you to follow through. Honestly, it’s like you didn’t even go to finishing school.”

Arthur smiles. “As a matter of fact, I didn’t even go to university. And finishing school is for young ladies, not for men.”

His accent gets all posh for a second. Merlin snickers.

“Sorry about that,” says Percival from behind them, making Merlin jump. “Got caught up.” He squeezes in beside them, then puts a beer down in front of Merlin and looks at Arthur. “It’s Arthur, isn’t it? We’ve met before.” Merlin looks between them as Percival reaches out to give Arthur’s hand a hearty shake. “Percival. Imagine me in rugby gear.”

“Sorry. I’m having trouble placing you.”

“Imagine knocking me out in rugby gear,” says Percival, eyes twinkling a bit. “Really think about it. Don’t hold back. Just go ahead and let loose.”

“Arthur,” says Merlin, surprised if he does say so himself, “did you knock Percival out playing rugby?”

“I really think I’d have remembered doing that,” says Arthur, looking Percival up and down with a frown. “But—”

“Imagine me knocking you out, then, and get all the mental revenge on me you like.”

Arthur’s mouth drops open. “That was you?”

“Yeah, that was me. Sorry for knocking you out. And er, sorry it’s taken so long to apologise.”

“And for making me try to remember you when I never even saw you,” Arthur says, and leans in to explain to Merlin. “About ten years ago, in college, your friend Percival here threw a rugby ball that landed me in hospital for two days and cut my rugby career in half—which it turns out was a good thing—and all my team could talk about afterwards was this fucking incredible throw that I didn’t see.”

He stays where he is but continues detailing the throw, or the game, or the match, to Percival. Merlin has difficulty paying attention to rugby conversations at the best of times. Right now Arthur’s knee is pressed up against his and his voice is low and intent in his ear, and then he stretches and Merlin is … distracted.

When Percival leaves to go and get them more drinks—one of them a belated apology drink—Arthur looks at him—his knee is still pressed against Merlin’s—and says, “Are you all right?”

“Yeah,” says Merlin, who has absolutely zero idea what they’ve been talking about now the rugby conversation has ended. Although maybe it still hasn’t.

Arthur stares at him. Merlin stares back.

It feels like a moment. Can you have moments with your, hmm, what to call Arthur. Your downstairs neighbour but two?

It’s not super catchy. Merlin will work on it.

They leave the pub late, walking out into a chilly wind. Sometime in the last hour it started drizzling. Merlin wraps his scarf tight and plunges his hands deep into his pockets, curling his fingers into his palms to keep them warm. Arthur is walking silently beside him, and Merlin, watching their shadows stretch and vanish into each other as they pass between streetlights—Merlin can’t decide what he’s feeling, actually. They’re walking in time with each other and Arthur is either too close or too far away, and Merlin doesn’t know why he’s even thinking about this, anyway.

He pulls off his scarf as soon as they get inside the building but leaves his coat on. The overhead lighting is bright and ugly and keeping his collar up makes him feel apart from it. He still can’t work out what to say to Arthur. Maybe this is the sexual identity crisis he’s been waiting for. Though to be honest—and Merlin’s really trying—it doesn’t feel like that, silent as they are in the lift together as the numbers ding on the first floor, then the second. It feels like mustering all the courage he has, all at once, as he takes a deep breath and:

“Wanna come up?” he blurts, just as the doors close behind Arthur, and then Merlin is just meeting the eyes of his own shocked reflection in the doors, the lift continuing its ascent.

Right, he thinks as the lift dings for the third, then fourth, then fifth floor. Okay.

There is a bottle of wine in his flat with his name on it. Merlin tries to let himself be happy with just that as he drops his bag on the sofa and shrugs his coat off and over the back of a chair.

There’s a knock.

“Let’s get rid of your tree,” says Arthur from the doorway. His chest is heaving, scarf still on, one glove on and one upturned in his coat pocket with the fingers all sticking out, no smile, not even waiting for Merlin to say yes, or no, before he walks past him like he owns the place.

Merlin looks out into the hall: the door to the stairwell is still swinging on its hinges.

He turns back and looks at Arthur, standing still and perhaps, Merlin thinks, a little nervous next to the window. Blimey. 

Merlin lets the door slam shut behind him. "I have a better idea.”


End file.
